There was high drama in Friday morning’s House Ways and Means Committee hearing on the IRS’s “lost emails” (translate that to old equipment that probably wasn’t helped by being defunded by the same party now putting on the witch hunt). Republicans like Paul Ryan took to the stage to hyperventilate at John Koskinen, the IRS Commissioner, accusing him of lying to the American people over lost emails.

Ways and Means Committee Chairman Camp (R-MI) has been issuing press releases like mad, building up a fevered case of missing emails that sounds pretty suspicious. Earlier this week he charged, “We now know documents from other central figures, like Nicole Flax, are missing… It looks like the American people were lied to and the IRS tried to cover-up the fact it conveniently lost key documents in this investigation.”

So, we now KNOW this. You follow? It’s a fact in evidence. Oh, the Obama liberals are at it again. Camp continued, “Plot lines in Hollywood are more believable than what we are getting from this White House and the IRS.”

Today he accused,“We are missing the emails of seven IRS officials and during periods critical to this investigation.”

Commissioner Koskinen explained today that Republicans really need to stop rushing to judgment before the facts are in, because it’s impossible to have a rational discussion without facts. Indeed, had Republicans waited until the facts were uncovered, they would have learned that Nicole Flax had two computers and only one crashed.

The portable computer that she used while traveling is the computer that crashed. (It might be nice to upgrade their equipment one day instead of giving corporations yet another tax subsidy. Just a thought if Republicans are going to demand that equipment never fail.)

Koskinen explained, “There’s been a question as to why I didn’t advise Congress earlier and my experience has been than we do better to have a rational discussion when you know all the facts. It’s shown by the fact that on Monday we were advised Monday morning that there were preliminary indications that there were difficulties with a handful of custodians. That information was passed onto the staff of this committee on Monday afternoon. Immediately thereafter rather than asking us for additional information a press release went out from this committee identifying Nicole Flax as a particularly interesting person to this committee and stating that Nicole Flax’s e-mails have been lost. Had the committee waited to issue that release until we knew further information which were continuing to provide, they would have discovered that Nicole Flax had two computers. Her office computer which she used during the day and she had a travel computer, a portable. It was the portable computer that crashed. It ran on the same e-mail system as her office system.”

“So it turns out there is no indication that a single Nicole Flax e-mail has been lost, notwithstanding the press release and statements out of this committee. Those press releases with regard to Nicole Flax were inaccurate and misleading and it demonstrates why we’ll provide this committee a full report about the custodian review when it is completed. And we are not going to dribble out the information and have it played out in the press.”

Oh. So all of this hyperventilating about lying and scandals and cover ups and it was the second computer that crashed, and while Republicans were making these accusations, the facts were not yet in evidence. They made the accusations before the facts were established. Why is that? “Plot lines in Hollywood are more believable than what we are getting from this White House and the IRS the Republican Party.”

Don’t hate on Republicans for prematurely freaking out yet again — you know they don’t understand technology and don’t understand the relationship between funding and having working equipment. No doubt there are plenty of equipment issues at the IRS and this creates a problem for transparency, but a Republican deliberate defunding campaign does not translate into a Democratic cover-up. At any rate, in this case, there is no evidence that the emails are lost.

At some point, the media is going to have to start calling foul on this kind of premature hysteria, in which Republicans state as facts things not yet in evidence.

It has not been established that a single Flax email is lost, but we resume the Republican Manufactured Drama That Is Being Played In Order to Avoid Real Issues because this is what the GOP does now instead of legislating.

Paul Ryan and House Republicans Hyperventilate Over Imaginary Lost IRS Emails was written by Sarah Jones for PoliticusUSA.

Ms. Jones is a Senior White House and Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Since joining Politicus in February of 2009, Sarah has been quoted by Talking Points Memo, The Atlantic Wire, CNN, MSNBC, The Week, The Hollywood Reporter, The Richard Dawkins Foundation and more. Sarah co-hosts Politicus Radio with Jason Easley and is the political correspondent for KPTR 1450's California Woman 411, hosted by Dee Jae Cox. Sarah is an award-winning producer with a background in TV/Film (TV host, news anchor, producer & writer) and a member of the Screen Actors Guild/AFTRA and SPJ. Sarah graduated Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a major in Psychology & minor in Latin. She spends her free time dancing (ballet) and horseback riding (English).

36 Responses to Paul Ryan and House Republicans Hyperventilate Over Imaginary Lost IRS Emails

Huckleberry

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 12:33 pm

I tried to think of something thoughtful to say. The GOP lie machine makes me sick with it’s constant drone. That’s all I got.

jackson

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 2:54 pm

You can’t think of anything to say becuase you can’t defend the indefensible. Lerner is at issue here not Paul Ryan. Her emails disappear a week after the jig was up and her actions were exposed. Then mysteroiusly the hard drives crash and so it is a Republican conspiracy. B$&tch please.

djchefron

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 2:58 pm

What jig was up? Oh you mean the one where only progressives were denied the tax exemption.

djchefron

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 3:12 pm

You really are stuck on stupid
GOP congressman outraged IRS did not deploy time travel machine

BOUSTANY: When was Lois Lerner’s hard drive recycled and made irretrievable?
KOSKINEN: She is was advised in the summer of 2011 that the criminal investigation division had been unable to retrieve emails off her hard drive and it was recycled. I will get you the date when…

BOUSTANY: I’m really disturbed that it took this long for the committee to find out this information buried in the letter we received on Friday.
KOSKINEN: There are emails last fall, productions, that referenced her hard drive crash, that no one was paying attention to. They were looking at all of the relevant information.
As Koskinen then pointed out, it’s true that the details of the crash were not known, but the fact that a crash had happened was no secret.

BOUSTANY: Why wasn’t this committee notified before a decision was made to completely recycle her hard drive?
KOSKINEN: Uh, the committee was not notified because that decision would have been made three years ago. It’s not a decision—none of this had anything to do with the investigation.

djchefron

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 3:15 pm

Continue
BOUSTANY: Well, I would submit it does have to do with the investigation, because we’re trying to get necessary information.
Yes, sir, you’re trying to get the information now. It’s 2014. Your hearings started in 2013. This decision was made in 2011. Time travel is not possible.

BOUSTANY: It disturbs me that this decision was made internally, without any kind of outside consultation, when this committee was vigorously pursuing information regarding this targeting scandal.
Seriously, at this point, even Louis Gohmert would have been shaking his head. Somehow, the IRS commissioner managed to restrain laughter, responding instead:

You forget or choose not to acknowledge that the IRS was targeting many groups including liberal groups. Your party has become “the boy who cried wolf” party. You have used EVERY opportunity to create a scandal against POTUS. Hell, the week before the Bergdhal prisoner exchange it was republican leaders trying to quash the school lunch program because Michelle Obama championed this cause.It’s pitiful and extremely transparent. No one other than your own choir believes anything that comes out of your operatives.

Scorpie

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 12:41 pm

If any of these idiots had ever worked for the IRS they might know enough to comment on the problems. I worked there 20 years ago and there were equipment problems then. Why, oh why will these “squawkers” never shut up?

kws1949

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 12:44 pm

Ryan should ask his pals at the NSA for copies.

lcelsie

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 12:49 pm

I want them to investigate why the IRS sent me a bill for 25 cents and spent 43 cent in postage to send it.

Nickeli

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 3:26 pm

IRS will not send a bill that is less than the postage cost, they used to, long time ago, but that changed. They found out that it is cheaper just to write it off.

John Taylor

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 12:56 pm

Why would anyone expect any other reaction from the GOP? Their M.O. is exactly the same every time they open their mouths. They actually think that the American people with a few brain cells haven’t figured it out. They have nothing, say nothing, and are nothing.

Buddy

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 1:04 pm

Paul Ryan and the GOP know all to well about lying!

Cassius

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 1:17 pm

Her”computer that crashed”, allegedly, is
totally irrelevant. Emails are sent between servers, not ‘computers’. Backups, and logs, are ALWAYS saved. Age, or condition,
of her laptop, or ANY computer, has nothing whatsoever to do with these false claims
by the IRS. Do you email from your phone?

djchefron

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:20 pm

This is why the Reich with their selective memory rates lower than the clap

New Documents Confirm Cheney’s Office “Lost” Plame Emails

Email

6
.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), which sued the Bush White House over millions of missing White House emails, has released a treasure trove of documents relating to the loss of the emails. We’re just beginning to go through them, but CREW says the headline item is that the documents seem to confirm that emails subpoenaed by Patrick Fitzgerald regarding the leak of Valerie Plame’s CIA identify were among those missing from Dick Cheney’s office.http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2009/06/new-documents-confirm-cheneys-office-lost-plame-emails

Nothing but crickets from the Reich on millions of missing emails. Now do you buy that?

TerryLF

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:43 pm

Did you read the article Cassius? The emails aren’t lost, there are no false claims by the IRS pertaining to these emails because, again, they were not lost. The claim that they were “lost” came from the GOP in another futile effort to gin up a scandal.

Lori

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 4:50 pm

This doesn’t say that the Lois Lerner emails aren’t lost. That’s what the Republicans have been in an uproar about.

TerryLF

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:47 pm

The GOP is desperate. I can just imagine that they are asking, behind closed doors of course, What are we going to do now?

Things haven’t been going well for the Gasbags of Politics here lately.

It couldn’t be happening to a better bunch of jerks IMO.

Oaken Truncheon

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 3:31 pm

You mean the Republican’s false claim that they were told that emails were missing, when that wasn’t what they were told at all, and that no emails were ever really missing, and nobody but the the Republicans on the committees ever suggested they were?

Or were you talking about something else?

nordangb

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 1:31 pm

Too bad they can’t get this worked up over something that would be constructive to help we the people.

repubkooks

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 1:58 pm

Another GOP/Fox/NRA/Teabircher/KKK phony scandal. Pass out the lighter fluid to the ignorant base so they can light their hair on fire!

freeportguy

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:04 pm

Per conservatives, there NEVER is worse “crime” than “lying to the American people”…which excludes, of course, a GOP President wrongly and purposely launching a war based on fabricated intelligence…

lorrene real

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:15 pm

News flash to the House Idiots –

Most of the American people are concerned with Global security, feeding, clothing,and housings our now extended families (yes children, and grandparents are moving in with Mom and Dad). Thanks to all your policies to tank the middle class dream, of our next generation being better of than the last.

Please Congress ask your selves. to quote you st.Ronny Reagan, “are you better off then you were?” Do us all a favor and go on another Vacation.

Mary James

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 2:48 pm

yawn!Poor little boys are down to 1 fake scandal. In their sad pathetic delusional world they believe it will bring down Obama and Maybe Hillary.

CharlesinCalif

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 4:28 pm

There’s a method to their madness. When no “smoking gun” email is discovered they’ll claim the “smoking gun” was in the missing emails, even if no emails are really missing. “We’re an empire now. We make our own reality.” – anon. Bush official.

Lori

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 4:48 pm

Im confused. So who is this Flax woman? I was under the impression that the Repubicans were in an uproar because the Lerner emails went missing.

lorrene real

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 4:53 pm

Another McCarty era type witch hunt. watch this hearing on C-Span 6/20/14. What a circus.

Frank the Bank

Fri, Jun 20th, 2014 at 7:32 pm

So now the GOP is so desperate they want to go all in with a missing e-mail conspiracy and coverup. None of this nonsense is going to help them in November. Ryan’s phony interest in the American taxpayer is laughable. He really thought he was going to be VP, he’s an idiot.

Pollytiques

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 6:13 am

I got as far as a crooked traitor like Paul Ryan having the brass to say the American people have been lied to…Then I cracked up. Couldn’t read any farther.

Sure Nuff Sherlock.. And most of the American people seems to be catching on to exactly who is doing the lying. I hope every one of the real terrorist in the US goes the same way Cantor did. FOLLOW THE MONEY. We need to ignore the BS the politicians shovel over it to cover where it really comes from and where it goes. One thing for certain, the working people who funds it all are not getting their share.

Kevin

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 6:14 am

Never under estimate conservatives ability to turn faux scandals to their political gain. The GOP it seems were successful in turning the American public against saving a POW. Over fifty percent in a recent NBC poll were against the prisoner swap. Never thought I would live to see the day something so overwhelmingly positive as bringing home a POW would turn the public against their president. Democrats in power better wake the hell up and start showing their supporters they care by pushing back hard.

Paws

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 7:42 am

“…accusing him of lying…”
————-

Little rich for Paul Ryan to be accusing anyone of lying considering all the falsehoods that have passed through his lips.

Honestly, could they just waste a little more time? We have serious issues to deal with and they’re playing tiddly-winks.

Unreal.

(Oh and if they ARE hyperventilating, no one pass them a paper bag to breathe into…please.)

K Clevinger

Sat, Jun 21st, 2014 at 10:39 am

Wow. Reading this article is a trip; a view into the far left media preaching to the choir. Clearly you are not a reporter but an individual with very slanted tunnel vision. I predict I could never read anything else you write but would still be able to summarize any future ‘articles’ you may write. Nothing like being given a pen and a paycheck to express your views – where can I sign up? Reality check is in order – should you choose… On a more serious note, how irresponsible to purposely mislead a group of devoted followers

They all are “Born-Again Liars”. They believe that whatever lie they spew is Gods words. Twisted and demented.

jefaubel

Sun, Jun 22nd, 2014 at 1:19 pm

Republicans don’t need to wait for the facts to come in, they know how to “legislate from the gut”. Who need facts when a simple “gut check” will provide them all the information they want to know (and none of the things they don’t want to know)?